Subscribe to this blog

Follow by Email

Posts

To celebrate the release of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films on beautiful Blu-ray, in a box-set crammed with all kinds of exclusive special features, I’ve been revisiting all seven films…

New Nightmare marked Wes Craven’s return to the series he kick-started with A Nightmare on Elm Street. It is a thoroughly intelligent and provocative post-modern horror that eclipses the whole Elm Street series with its foreboding atmosphere and chilling implications. It not only entertains, but provides pointed commentary on horror cinema, the nature of fear, and the darker side of pop culture. While there is a lot of reflection on the workings of horror cinema, New Nightmare is still a highly effective horror film in its own right.

To celebrate the release of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films on beautiful Blu-ray, in a box-set crammed with all kinds of exclusive special features, I’ve been revisiting all seven films…

Freddy’s Dead was designed to bid farewell to one of contemporary horror cinema’s most iconic bogeymen, Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund). While it certainly aims for an epic feel – complete with cameo appearances from the likes of Johnny Depp, Rosanne Barr and Alice Cooper, and a climactic 3D showdown between Krueger and his estranged, and previously unmentioned daughter, that takes places within the mind of Krueger himself - it just can’t pull it off.

Emerging as one of the weakest titles in the series, director Rachel Talalay’s attempts to give Freddy’s Dead a darker, grittier edge are lost beneath the clownish Freddy shenanigans and ridiculous death scenes.

Bad Milo! tells of Duncan, a mild-mannered office worker who, due to the huge amount of stress he faces at work and in his personal life, begins suffering from intense gastrointestinal pains. Much to his horror he discovers that his unusual stomach problems are actually caused by a tiny demon dwelling in his intestines. To make matters worse, said demon emerges to unleash bloody retribution upon those who have angered Duncan...

With its pint-sized menace, light comedic tone, buckets of splatter and irreverent humour, Bad Milo! echoes the work of Frank Henenlotter, as well as other miniature-monster titles such as It’s Alive, Critters, Sewage Baby, Ghoulies, and of course, Gremlins. What is most surprising is that it unfolds as a strangely touching and highly quirky comedy about relationships and the pressures of modern society.

Head over to Exquisite Terror to read my full review and win a copy of Bad Milo! on DVD.

To celebrate the recent release of the A Nightmare on Elm Street films on beautiful Blu-ray, in a box-set crammed with all kinds of exclusive special features, I’ve been revisiting all seven films…

The Dream Child marks a definite decline in the quality of the series, which is really saying something. An interesting and creepy central concept – the dream killer attempting to reach nemesis Alice through the dreams of her unborn child – is smothered beneath Freddy’s mouthy antics and the increasingly ridiculous death sequences. The uneven tone distracts from director Stephen Hopkins’ attempts to return the series to its dark roots, complete with an impressive Gothic atmosphere. The high/low-light comes when a comic book geek is sucked into one of his drawings (just like in the A-ha music video for Take On Me), turned to paper and shredded by Krueger.

Italian horror maestro Dario Argento and punk-rock icon Iggy Pop are using the crowd-funding site Indiegogo in an attempt to fund new horror film, The Sandman. Based on the terrifying 1816 short story Der Sandmann by German romantic writer ETA Hoffmann, and adapted by writer David Tully especially for Argento, The Sandman looks set to revisit some familiar Argento troupes. The story tells of Nathan, a college student who suffered a terrifying childhood experience when he witnessed the death of his mother at the hands of a masked serial killer nicknamed The Sandman (Iggy Pop), due to his tendency to remove his victims’ eyes as trophies. Years later, when Nathan witnesses the gruesome death of a beautiful young woman in the apartment opposite his, he believes The Sandman has returned from the grave to instigate another brutal killing spree...

Iggy Pop has stated: "Dario and I want to make the film that we want to make, our way, and that means going direct to the people who have re…

The A Nightmare on Elm Street series has just been released on beautiful Blu-ray, in a box-set crammed with all kinds of exclusive special features. In the run up to Halloween I’ll be revisiting all seven films and taking a look at the extra features.

Directed by Renny (Cliffhanger) Harlin, this Elm Street instalment was firmly marketed at the MTV generation, with its rock-laden soundtrack, effects-heavy set pieces, comic-book tone and portrayal of Krueger as a wise-cracking anti-hero. Prior to Freddy vs Jason and the 2010 remake of the original film, this was the most commercially successful film in the series and its further dilution of central antagonist Freddy Krueger really helped move the Elm Street films into the mainstream; with Krueger attaining pop-icon status en route.

The A Nightmare on Elm Street series has just been released on beautiful Blu-ray, in a box-set crammed with all manner of exclusive special features. In the run up to Halloween I’ll be revisiting all seven films and taking a look at the extra features.

Next up is A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 3: Dream Warriors; not only one of the stronger entries in the series, but also a thrilling fantasy-horror in its own right. While the tone is much lighter than the previous instalments, thanks to the involvement of Wes Craven, it is not without its darker moments; that the main characters are the troubled teen-aged residents of a psychiatric hospital, and the predominant themes are mental illness, familial dysfunction and teenage suicide, is highly telling of Craven’s involvement. It’s not all doom and gloom though, as a comic book/super-hero feel prevails, and Krueger is firmly established as the wise-cracking anti-hero that would make him a pop-icon of the Eighties.

The A Nightmare on Elm Street series has just been released on Blu-ray, in a box-set containing the first seven films and a plethora of exclusive special features. While I’ve delved into the Elm Street series before, it’s always good to revisit old favourites; especially when they’ve been released in shiny HD and in a box-set crammed with all sorts of geeky goodies. Over the next few weeks I’ll be revisiting all seven films and taking a look at the extra features accompanying them.

The tagline for Freddy’s Revenge boasts that “The man of your dreams is back!” While this is certainly true, he’s back in a sequel sadly lacking in the surreal intensity and creepy ingenuity of its predecessor. Director Jack Sholder takes the story in a new, body-horror orientated direction, with child killer Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund) attempting to possess a teenaged boy (Mark Patton) and emerge into the waking world, which results in a strangely homoerotic subtext. As the story progresses it takes t…

James is the author of several books about horror films, and he frequently contributes to Exquisite Terror and Diabolique. His writing has also appeared in various online and print publications including Paracinema, Film Ireland, Eye for Film, Little White Lies and The Quietus.